Uprooted
by RanMouri82
Summary: A mysterious gift for Verdana and Vivaldi unlocks the door between worlds. Based on "Unexpected" by kazefiend (Tumblr / Archive of Our Own); UPDATE (1/10/17): Learned about the Flowerfell AU fic ban and am waiting to hear if this Baby Hell fic can stay. Since most of this fic is already posted, though, I plan to finish and post the remaining chapters.
1. Peace

Buttercups.

In Frisk's upturned palm sat twin silver barrettes, slim and simple, each decorated on one end with a crystal buttercup. Morning sun shone through the bedroom window and glanced on the barrettes' jeweled surface in radiant fragments of golden light.

The beautiful gift did not strike Frisk as odd. Despite how buttercups once cursed the tall, slender human back in the Underground, overtaking their body and poisoning them with each reset, most humans and monsters on the surface knew that Frisk's identical twins, Verdana and Vivaldi, tucked buttercups and flowery clips like these into their short, dark hair. The barrettes had arrived in a red box with a velvet, cushioned base and silk bow, hand-delivered by a trusted friend. But the gift giver was suspicious.

Frisk narrowed their red eyes at the crystal flowers. "Hmm."

"Better scrub your hands, sweetheart," Sans grunted, peering over his wife's shoulder at the mysterious present. He clenched his sharp teeth, adding, "That bitch Alphys ain't above poisoning."

"Didn't hurt me earlier," Frisk said, shaking their head. They first inspected the box's contents a week ago, when Undyne had given it to them before their morning jog. Until now, Dr. Alphys had shown less interest in being a friendly aunt than in cracking the twins' genetic code as monster-human hybrids. "...What if," Frisk mused, turning the lovely little clips over in their palm, "it _is_ an apology?"

"Just 'cause Undyne said it's so don't make it so." Frowning as much as his skull allowed, Sans fumbled with the black tie of the ironed suit that his mother-in-law, Toriel, now downstairs with the kids, had insisted he wear to the day's event. His button-down shirt felt tight against his bulky ribs and shoulder blades. Frisk had long since dressed in a rose blouse, violet vest embroidered with the Delta Rune, and tailored pants, so everyone was waiting on Sans. "Dunno what she sees in Alphys."

Crashes and footstomps rang from the living room. Verdana's energy and Toriel's ire were skyrocketing. Though muffled by their bedroom walls, Frisk and Sans heard a bellowing Toriel shout, "Oh, no you _don't_ , young man!"

No time to waste. Frisk closed their fist around the hair clips.

Gathered on the crest of Mt. Ebott beneath puffy, white clouds that sailed along a vibrant blue sky, crowds murmured beside the fortified entrance of what was once the barrier enclosing the Underground. National, city, and local press snapped a constant stream of pictures of the crimson ribbon strung in front of its open doors and of the important people standing on a nearby dais: the prime minister of the nation, the king and queen of monsters, the local mayor, and the monsters' human ambassador with their monster husband and young twins.

After years of cleanup, renovation, and preparation, humans and monsters were ready for the official opening of the National Museum of Monster History. From now on, the once-sealed Underground would be open for common, public use.

On the dais, Frisk and Sans kept the twins engaged in a word game. Vivaldi rocked back and forth in her penny loafers and tapped her chin in thought while Verdana squirmed, but held more or less still under the threat of being pinned by his father's magic.

"...pudding, onions, and before that," Vivaldi whispered, "nuggets of chicken."

"Viv, that's cheating!" cried Verdana.

As one, Frisk and Toriel turned toward him with a finger to their lips. "Ssh!"

Sans thought, but knew better than to say out loud, that maybe it was not the best idea to bring the twins. At least, not in front of news cameras where they would have to stand around like centerpieces. But since it was a museum opening, Toriel had insisted it would add a special note of importance to educating the young and blah, blah, blah.

In the middle of his itchy discomfort, however, Sans admitted, as Frisk had mentioned earlier when clipping the twins' hair aside with the shining barrettes, that their kids looked adorable. Pulling their hair back revealed the big, ruby eyes they inherited from their mother. And thanks to the comfortable, but fine red-striped sweaters that their grandmother had knitted for them, black for Ver and white for Viv, they were slightly less antsy. Slightly.

Vivaldi scrunched her pudgy face at her brother, who had turned his pointer finger to bone and waved it in her face with his best I'm-not-touching-you technique. "Stop it!"

" _Ssh!_ "

Sans groaned.

Finally, it seemed the PM and Asgore were done with their opening speeches, so the group could breathe a bit easier as the reporters and their cameras shifted their collective focus to the plush ribbon and the giant pair of scissors intended to cut it. Frisk touched their husband's shoulder and smiled. This was more than a museum to them. This was peace.

The twins tried thumb wrestling next, but remembered to use their inside voices as they locked their hands into a fist. "One, two, three, four, I declare thumb—huh?" Their barrettes sparkled—no, _glowed_ —with an aura that soon engulfed them. The scared children tried and failed to pull their hands apart. They were stuck together! Verdana used his free hand to grasp his mother's trousers.

In what felt like slow motion, Frisk slipped away from Sans; a moment later, as Sans turned, a blaze of red magic swallowed his wife and children. His hand reached out to them a split second too late, and he grabbed empty air.

They were gone.

* * *

As quickly as the blinding light appeared, it vanished. Frisk could only register three things: One, their children clung to their waist for dear life. Two, they were enveloped in darkness.

Three, they were _falling_.


	2. Ruins

Soft grass cushioned Frisk as a delicate scent opened their eyes to a sideways view of cheerful, golden blossoms. Buttercups. Lifting their head, dazed, they saw Vivaldi and Verdana standing beside them, hand in hand, staring up at the ceiling of a massive cave. Stone columns surrounded them and rose to frame a single gap high above their heads. Had they fallen through there?

"Mommy? Where are we?"

That snapped Frisk awake. Lifting themselves into a kneeling position, they scanned the distracted twins for injuries. Aside from Vivaldi's skinned knee—patched with an adhesive bandage Frisk had in their pocket—and a bump above Verdana's eye that would surely need ice, they were fine. However, a sharp pain in Frisk's right ankle made the human pause and look down. Sprained, not broken, but walking on it would be a problem.

"I...think we fell Underground," Frisk murmured, fumbling in their pockets for their smartphone. Its screen was cracked beyond repair and there was no signal, so it was impossible to dial Sans. Sunlight from the surface filtered down to where they knelt near the towering stone pillars, but they heard no noise except for their fidgeting children and dripping stalactites. The Ruins were structurally sound and well-kept by the many years of Toriel's care, Frisk knew, though they could have sworn the museum designers had added guardrails. Where did they go?

"We were by Grandma and Grandpa's old house, right?" said Vivaldi, as Verdana nodded at his sister and grabbed the largest stick he could find for a makeshift crutch. "This place looks funny."

"Right. You two," Frisk said, suppressing the panic that surged in their stomach, "haven't been down here yet. But I have." Patting Verdana's head in gratitude and giving Vivaldi their best reassuring smile, they balanced on the stick, climbed to their feet, and said, "I know the way out."

The twins looked at each other, confused, but nodded.

"These are the Ruins," Frisk explained as they led the way and hobbled around a craggy corner. "The other end of the Underground. Monsters settled here first after—"

Beneath a shaft of light ahead of them, a single flower popped up from the soil and smiled.

Frisk fell silent. _Asriel?_

"Howdy! I'm Flowey," cooed the talking plant, his voice dripping with saccharine. "Flowey the Flower!"

The twins blinked at Flowey out of curiosity. Frisk stared. They tried moving their lips, but no sound came out.

Gaining no response, Flowey continued, "You three are new to the Underground, aren'tcha?"

Frisk shook their head in shock while tears sprang to their eyes. How did their brother not recognize them? "No."

Flowey's smile slipped somewhat, but then he shrugged his leaves and gave them a sparkling wink. "Someone ought to teach you how things work around here! Your soul starts off weak, but can grow strong if you gain a lot of LOVE. You want some LOVE, don't you? Don't worry, I'll share some with you!"

This was wrong. Very wrong.

Frisk leaned against their stick and nudged the twins to hide behind their legs. This had to be a nightmare. Flowey, their best friend and brother, the companion by their side from the beginning, who had watched the first flowers sprout through their skull, would never, _ever_ kill!

Suddenly, Frisk felt their soul yank forward. Losing balance, the human fell to their knees, scraped their palms against gravel, and clenched their jaw as their ankle throbbed in pain.

"Mommy!" Verdana and Vivaldi dashed in front of Frisk, joined hands, and glared at the flower. "Leave our mother alone!" cried Verdana. Thin, frail bones materialized around the twins like a cluster of reddened toothpicks, and Vivaldi chimed in, "You bully!"

"No!" Frisk crawled toward the twins. "Stop!"

"Your funeral, kids," Flowey said, producing an array of piercing bullets. His smile twisted and frayed. "DIE."

Frisk reached between their children, who were more precious to them than the red soul that hovered above their chest, and desperately tried to pull them to safety.

 _Flash!_

Flame burst past the trio and knocked the flower out of sight. Frisk peered into the distance, knowing that fire magic. At the same time, the red magic that had superglued the twins' hands together faded completely.

"What a terrible creature, torturing such poor, innocent—oh!" Through black wisps of smoke emerged Toriel, clutching her bosom in surprise. "Three of you!"

Frisk nodded, smiling sadly as the twins helped them to their feet again. Toriel rushed to take over, allowing Frisk to brace their arms against hers and stand to full height. Unlike the Toriel that Frisk knew, this goat monster wore a long, purple tunic and stood a mere head taller than them. It felt surreal.

"Why's Grandma so short?" Verdana muttered.

"Maybe she's Grandma's cousin," Vivaldi said.

Frisk held a finger to their lips as soon as they regained their footing.

"These are your little ones, I presume. I am Toriel, caretaker of the Ruins," she said, giving the human a kind grin. "Are you hurt? There, there, I will heal you."

Bending down to touch Frisk's twisted ankle, Toriel healed it with the gentle warmth that had blazed from her hands a minute ago. Spotting the minor injuries on Viv and Ver, she tended those, too.

"Thank you," Frisk said, sighing with relief. This Toriel was even kinder than the one who had adopted them. They felt a pang of guilt at the thought.

"You are quite welcome, dear," replied Toriel, leading them toward a looming entrance with a dual staircase. "I pass through this place every day to see if anyone has fallen down, but you three are the first humans to come in a long time."

"Why would they fall down?" Vivaldi cried. She and Verdana raised their hands in the air as if warming them on an invisible fire. "Grandpa said big men put a cap on top of the hole—"

"Ssh," Frisk hushed, tucking Vivaldi's hair behind her ear. They took that moment to look both twins in the eye before holding out their left hand and touching their right thumb to it in a downward "L". _Later._

The twins stuck close to their mother after that, but began to cheer up as Toriel-but-not-Toriel introduced them to the puzzles of the Ruins. Frisk noted with great relief that they were called 'puzzles' instead of 'deathtraps'.

"Diversions and doorkeys," Vivaldi repeated to herself, fond of the phrase. Verdana took great pride in flipping switches as fast as possible and in chatting up the training dummy. Frisk digested the sameness and difference in silence. Froggits bounced toward them a few times but, between the warning stares of both mothers, stayed out of their way.

"Ah," Toriel said, stopping short at the end of a long hallway. Blushing, she turned toward Frisk and the twins. "I must attend to some business, but I would hate to make you stay alone."

Frisk realized what the errand was about. Managing to laugh for the first time during this strange run, they said, "Don't worry. We can make it safely to your house."

"Yup!" piped up Verdana, while Vivaldi tugged dried leaves out of her brother's hair. Both twins loved the crinkling sounds the leaf piles made. "We're determined!"

Toriel thanked them and gave Frisk her cell phone before departing. As soon as she disappeared, Frisk pocketed the clunky phone with care and led the twins into the next room.

After walking a bit in silence, Verdana copied his mother's gesture and said, "It's 'later', huh?"

Frisk nodded and took each child by the hand. Ahead of them was a puzzle: three dirt tracks set with three stones. After helping their daughter to sit on the middle stone, they moved to seat their son on the right.

" _Whoa_ there, pardner!"

All three blinked. Did the rock just talk?

"I don't mind being a tush cushion," said the rock, immobile, "but ask next time, will ya, pumpkin?"

Frisk apologized and gave giddy giggles. Guess they did not have privacy just yet, after all. Once more, Frisk signed, _Later._

After meeting a melancholy, yet sweet Napstablook that Vivaldi again assumed was his lookalike cousin, completing several more puzzles and tending to the twins' rumbling tummies with Vegetoid greens and Spider sweets, Frisk found a balcony with a breathtaking view of Home.

"Are we almost home, Mommy?" Vivaldi said, nudging Frisk's leg. Perking up at her question, Verdana skipped to her side after sticking something in his pocket.

"Come here," Frisk said, gathering the twins in close and rubbing their backs. This conversation could be delayed no longer. "I'm not sure how, but we're Underground. Just not our Underground."

"Told you that lady wasn't Grandma," Vivaldi said, elbowing Verdana.

"She _is_ Grandma, but she's not your grandmother here," Frisk corrected, shaking their head. "Remember the story of Alice and the mirror?"

Both twins nodded, though Vivaldi enjoyed Lewis Carroll's quirky tale and its topsy-turvy world much more than her brother.

"We did that." Frisk held their gaze. "...We're in another world's Underground."

Verdana and Vivaldi gaped, their red eyes widening with fear.

"Don't be scared," Frisk added, kissing their foreheads. "I think we got here by your magic. We just need to get back. Do you remember how you did it?"

Chins trembling, the twins shook their heads and stammered at the same time, "We were playing, and then—that light—we felt magic like when Uncle Papyrus teaches us—but _really_ strong—our hair clips lit up—we're sorry—"

Frisk felt their throat go dry. "Hair clips?"

Vivaldi nodded. "Now it feels weird when we hold hands."

"Yeah, like our magic's too big," Verdana said.

Alphys. What did Alphys do to them?!

Frisk closed their eyes, clenched their fists, and counted backwards from ten. Slowly. Opening their eyes once their rage ebbed, they forced a smile for the twins and said, "We'll find a way home. But we've got to be careful, so let's take the hair clips off." Reaching to grasp the clip in Vivaldi's hair, they added, "For now, I'll hold onto— _aah!_ "

Yanking their fingers away from the jolts of magic that coursed through their body, Frisk quivered. Their fingertips were singed. The cavern began to spin.

"M-Mom!" Verdana shrieked as Vivaldi sobbed.

The spinning grew until everything went black.


	3. Heartache

Frisk fluttered their eyelids drowsily and woke on a bed in a darkened room. Their head ached with dull pain. A migraine? While staring at the dingy ceiling overhead, nostalgia filled Frisk, though the bed that supported them was altogether too short and cramped their bent legs. Then, they heard a pair of even breaths, one on each side, and glanced down. Verdana snoozed with his rump in the air while Vivaldi held a stuffed bear in the crook of her elbow. On instinct, the twins snuggled closer to them on the bed, but kept sleeping. Their children were safe. If they were in the spare bedroom of Toriel's house….

In the hushed stillness, the day's exhausting events made the twins sleep as deeply as their father always did, but fear wrenched Frisk's soul and swelled their throat, reminding them of how far they were from home. Frisk longed for Sans, for his voice and touch, but believed they would make it back to his arms. Their children would return to their father, no matter what. Shrugging off their doubts with their blankets, the human slipped out of bed and tiptoed down the hall.

As expected, Toriel sat by her magical fire and curled up with a book, _72 Uses for Snails_. Circles darkened the space beneath her eyes, just visible behind her reading glasses, but she said nothing.

"Thank you again for healing me and my children," Frisk said, dipping their head into a slight, respectful bow. A warm cinnamon scent wafted through the living room. "Sorry for causing you trouble."

"No trouble, dear," Toriel said, her forehead knit with concern. "Please sit."

Ever the obedient child with any Toriel, Frisk nodded and brought over a chair from the dining table. Since three chairs waited there, Frisk wondered about this dimension's Asgore, but already knew what had become of Asriel.

"The emblem on your vest," said Toriel with a pause, catching sight of Frisk's back, "is the Delta Rune. The symbol of the monster kingdom."

Since Frisk had trailed behind while traversing the Ruins, they figured Toriel had not noticed that aspect of their clothing before. Turning around, Frisk sat in their chair and nodded again.

Brushing her tunic's Delta Rune with her furry fingertips, Toriel leveled a hard stare at the human. "Where did you receive it?"

"Up. The surface." Quirking a sad smile, Frisk pointed to the ceiling. "But in another world. Our barrier's broken, and monsters and humans live in peace. There, I—I'm your child."

"My child?" Toriel's eyes misted, but she shook her head and blinked the tears away. "You fell down?"

"Into my Underground, yes," Frisk said. They shuddered. Back then, damp air had blown thin coats of monster dust all over the Ruins. How many times had Toriel mutilated them in a copy of this very room? Death after death, buttercup after buttercup, with nothing but Flowey worrying for them and an inner voice urging them to ' _Stay determined_.' They gulped and strained to suppress those horrible memories. "But it was filled with LOVE."

"I understand. I will press no further," Toriel said. She stood, walked into the kitchen, and emerged with a large tray that held a steaming teapot and cups. Setting these down on the table, she said, "There is something else I noticed. You are certainly human, but…."

"My children." Frisk smiled. Just like her mother to be sensitive about a topic most humans and monsters were downright rude and opinionated about. "I married a monster. We had twins."

"I sensed magic in them from the first, but earlier, when they came running to me in tears, they glowed red and your little Verdana was a skeleton," Toriel said, blinking her wide eyes but recovering enough to pour the tea. "I had no idea such a thing was possible."

"The other you was amazed, too. We all were," Frisk said, rising to offer help which Toriel gently waved away.

"I hope the other me handled it gracefully. And took up educating the children." Toriel handed Frisk a full teacup and saucer. "This may come as a surprise to you, but I have always wanted to be a teacher. Actually, perhaps that isn't very surprising. Still."

Frisk laughed and accepted the cup. Earthy, herbal scents tickled their nose.

"That reminds me of a joke I learned the other day," Toriel said as they settled back into their seats. "Why did the skeleton need a sweater?" When Frisk shook their head, Toriel answered, "Because he was chilled to the bone!"

They laughed freely together, deciding without words that they both needed time to relax and be normal. Just for awhile.

The next morning, dark as always in the Underground, Vivaldi and Verdana tore into Toriel's butterscotch-cinnamon pie with delight. It brightened their cheeks until they were rosy with health. As soon as the adults told the children that Toriel understood they were hybrids, Verdana eagerly turned himself skeletal. He liked doing that more than Vivaldi, well, unless a juicy prank was involved. Then they were both game.

"But we still have to be careful," Frisk urged when Verdana started flipping forms like a light switch. "The barrier is up. Unless they have seven human souls—"

"One more," Toriel interrupted, shaking her head. She scowled. "That man only needs one more human." Her sad gaze drifted to the twins. "Or maybe two half-humans."

Frisk took a deep breath and rose from the table. "We have to find the Royal Scientist."

"You mean," Vivaldi piped up, first swallowing her food to mind her manners, "Dr. Alphys?"

"Isn't she a bad lady?" Verdana said, tugging woefully at the hair clip that, while not dangerous to the twins, refused to come off or even budge.

"...I don't think she's bad," Frisk said, through gritted teeth. Thinking of the Alphys from their world made them want to scream. Calming down, they added, "But the Alphys here might be kind. And able to help."

"I don't know this Alphys you speak of," said Toriel, dropping her jaw, "but you cannot possibly be thinking of traveling Underground. They—Asgore—will kill you."

"The Asgore of my world," Frisk said, standing behind their children and stroking their heads, "loves us very much."

Toriel bowed her horned head in sorrow. Without another word, she left the table, creaking the weathered floorboards as she walked to the middle staircase and went downstairs.

"Where's Grandma going?" asked Verdana.

"To the door leading to the rest of the Underground," Frisk said, solemn. They watched Toriel disappear into the basement and listened until her soft footsteps faded completely. "To destroy it."

"Oh no!" Vivaldi cried, leaping out of her seat. But Frisk touched her shoulder.

"When we go down there, I think Toriel will fight me because she's scared for us," Frisk continued, turning the twins to face them. "Stay far behind me and wait."

Verdana's eyes went wide. He grabbed his mother's wrist. "No!"

"We'll fight, too!" Vivaldi insisted.

"Please," Frisk said, crouching to their eye level. They cupped the twins' faces and stroked their cheeks. "Trust me."

The twins curled their hands into fists, but nodded. Then, they followed Frisk down into the basement's musty, violet corridor, albeit slowly, as if marching to their doom. They both fought the urge to run ahead of their mother and, instead, obediently lagged behind. If Mommy could be brave, they would be brave, too. Many places in the Ruins, like a fun leaf pile or a mouse hole near stuck cheese, had encouraged them to be brave and stay determined.

In fact, each point looked just like Daddy's star necklace.

"Wait!" Gasping, Vivaldi yanked her brother's arm. "Mommy didn't save!"

"Didn't Mommy see Daddy's star in the leaves?" Verdana cried, pointing to the distant Ruins behind him. "Or in front of Grandma's house?"

This time, Vivaldi did not bother arguing over whether or not Toriel was Grandma, but shook her head.

"Then Mommy's in big trouble!" said Verdana. Snatching Vivaldi's hand, he shouted, "C'mon, Viv!"

Balls of flame ringed Toriel's hands, and the ancient monster flung them at Frisk, who dodged the clusters easily. Another fiery attack followed, and then another, but Frisk hopped back and forth as if the two adults were playing a deadly game of double dutch. When the twins trotted toward them and saw this, they charged forward at full speed.

"Stop!" cried Verdana, rushing ahead.

Vivaldi trembled at his side but kept running. "Please, stop!"

Startled, Toriel's aim skewed wide and her attack blasted the spot where Frisk stood. Then Toriel froze in horror as Frisk screamed.

The twins jumped between them and took the full force of the fire.

Time stuttered.

* * *

Continue.

* * *

"Mommy!"

Frisk jolted awake and sat up, again on the bed in Toriel's house, their children again curled up on either side. But this time, the twins clutched them and sobbed, quaking with relief and fear.

And then, Frisk remembered. Staring with wonder at Vivaldi and Verdana as the twins wrapped their little arms around Frisk's waist and dampened it with tears, Frisk said, "You two. You reset."

They nodded.

Hands shaking and pulse racing to drown out all thought, Frisk silently begged the heavens for mercy while searching every inch of their children's bodies, still so small and growing, for a specific type of injury. Not bruises, not skinned knees, not sprained ankles, not even burns. Frisk fought to focus. Please, no!

None. No flowers?

Frisk then checked their own body, bracing to find and tug a stray buttercup that would shoot them through with dull, overwhelming pain. Still nothing.

Soon, the twins' curiosity dried their eyes. "Mommy," asked Vivaldi, wiping her flushed cheeks with her white sweater sleeve as Frisk gazed at them both, stunned, "what are you looking for?"

No curse.

Frisk's face crumpled. They were safe. They would live. Grabbing the twins, Frisk held them tight and wept.

* * *

The three of them slept late, or at least pretended so, since now there was much more that the family could discuss. By no means did Frisk want the twins to ever, under any circumstances, endanger themselves like that again. The twins learned why their mother could dodge Grandma's fire magic so easily: practice.

Thanks to the absent flower curse and Frisk's muscle memory of a much harder fight, however rusty they were, they beat Toriel in one try. Frisk had the use of both eyes and noticed that this Toriel's resolve to fight was remarkably weak. Several turns in, Frisk stood still with the twins directly behind them because Toriel's fire sailed wide in a pitiful attempt to look threatening. Toriel begged, pleaded, and then gave up. She could not stop them from offering mercy, and she could no longer drum up the will to block their way.

Before departing the Ruins, Toriel asked them not to return. The twins sniffled, heartbroken that their grandmother would say such a thing, but Frisk had a twinkle in their ruby eyes, knowing better. Frisk hugged Toriel fiercely and murmured, "See you soon, Mom."

The moment they left Toriel behind and went through the first set of exit doors, Frisk halted and flung their arms in front of the twins. Flowey had returned.

"I bet you feel really great. Kids love playing the hero. Until they fail," Flowey said with a snicker. He looked Frisk up and down, smirked, and said, "But you know that already, don'tcha?"

Frisk glared back. Flowey disappeared into the earth.

Vivaldi grasped Frisk's blouse. "I'm scared, Mommy."

"Don't worry, sis! I've got a _bone_ to pick with that mean flower," Verdana crowed, thumping his chest in a show of bravado. "I'll protect you!"

Frisk swallowed the lump in their throat, but said nothing and led the way to Snowdin.


	4. Snowdin

"Ver, stop," Vivaldi grumbled. She rubbed her sweater sleeves and shivered while her shoes crunched the wet snow. "Change back already."

"Why should I change? I'm warm!" Verdana said, skipping happy circles around his family as a skeleton. Faint breezes rustled the frosty, overhanging pine trees and whistled between Verdana's bones. "It's safer this way, right?"

Frisk frowned. They had been pondering this very question. What were the monsters in this version of the Underground like? Would the twins be safer concealing their human nature? Comparing the two Toriels—Frisk's stomach knotted at realizing Sans would love that pun—left them thinking the others might also be softer, less prone to violence and more inclined to mercy. Unfortunately, if the children went about as skeletons, it would be much harder to stay together by convincing everyone that they were the twins' mother. Then again, maybe that could help. Frisk would be the only apparent human.

But there was Flowey. This version of their brother was cold, soulless, and right. The twins could reset. Self-sacrifice for them would be doomed from the start.

If anyone knew the twins were both human and monster, what then? Sadly, the Alphys from their world could not be trusted. But what about the Alphys of this world?

Behind them, Frisk heard a branch snap. This was bad. "Ver, was that you?"

"No," the boy said, points of red light glowing in his eye sockets. "Why?"

"Take a shortcut past the bridge," Frisk whispered, bending over the twins. It would be a tall order for them to teleport because they had only managed it a few times, but if the barrettes did what Frisk suspected they did, it could work. "Stay skeleton and hide from monsters for now. Watch out for puzzles. Don't turn human until I meet you."

"But, Mom—" Vivaldi began to say.

"Viv!" Verdana said, grabbing her hand. Vivaldi nodded and, with the faintest red light, the twins disappeared together.

Silence fell only to be broken a second later by crisp footfalls that crept up behind Frisk and then stopped.

"Human. Don't you know how to greet a new pal?"

A shiver raced up Frisk's spine. It was Sans. His voice had the same intonation as the one burned in their memory, though it was less gruff and slightly higher pitched. And this time, they were alone.

He continued. "Turn around and shake my hand."

Frisk recalled what happened the very first time they heard Sans—their Sans—say that. What if this Sans electrocuted them? Would the children risk themselves by resetting? But something inside told Frisk not to worry. Taking a deep breath, they stared at their chilled feet, turned around, and lifted their hand.

Slapping Sans in his jawbone. "Ow."

Frisk gasped. This Sans only came up to their chest. "Oh, sorry!"

"Welp, that didn't go as planned," replied the skeleton, except this one had an easy smile and wore a blue hoodie with fluffy, pink slippers. The lights of his eyes were white and glinted with humor. "Care to try again?"

As Sans rubbed his round chin, Frisk had to choke down their snickers to avoid adding insult to injury. This was not their husband at all. Aiming much lower this time, they shook Sans' hand and was greeted by a whoopee cushion's long, wet, fart noise. But as soon as the urge to laugh bubbled up inside Frisk, it died. As it was, their children could have stayed. Were they in more danger alone? Frisk could not call them back. They should have given the twins Toriel's cell phone, found some way to call them, and then—

"Uh, I said it's _always_ funny," Sans repeated. "You okay?"

Frisk shook their head, but then nodded.

"Anyway, I'm Sans. Sans the Skeleton. I'm actually supposed to be on watch for humans right now. But, y'know, I don't really care about capturing anybody," he said, shrugging and peering sidelong at the disoriented human. The old lady sure knew how to pick them. And how to dress them. A human wearing the Delta Rune looked terribly suspicious. "Now my brother, Papyrus—"

"Papyrus! That's right!" Frisk cried, turning pale. They leaned close to Sans and gasped, "Where is he on his rounds? Can we beat him to Snowdin?"

"He's coming a _round_ right now, past those wide bars," Sans said, tilting his head in that direction. This human was downright strange. And well informed. "Quick, behind that inconveniently-shaped lamp."

Frisk ran for it and curled up as tightly behind the lamp as possible. Maybe one of the twins could fit here, but not them. If anything, the lamp looked like it sprouted a full head of hair. They were finished. Their children! They could only hope the twins escaped, would keep monster form, and….

"SANS!" Papyrus strode proudly along the path, swinging his bony arms high, his white battle body immaculate against the gleaming snow. Or so he liked to think.

Sans yawned and cracked his knuckles. "Sup, bro?"

"You know what 'sup', brother!" Papyrus huffed and stomped his cherry red boots at Sans' lazy response. "It's been eight days and you still haven't recalibrated your puzzles!"

From their vantage point, Frisk eyed Papyrus in shock. He was truly the skeleton they knew, that is, if some higher being had taken their Papyrus, filed down all his vicious edges—including his teeth—given him a permanent smile, and dipped him into a vat of marshmallow rainbows. Even his impatient stomps looked comical. Not the least bit imposing. Frisk froze when Sans mentioned the lamp, but The Great Papyrus somehow failed to notice them behind their terrible hiding spot.

Sans fired a skeleton pun and grinned as Papyrus groaned. "Come on, you're smiling."

"I know and I hate it!" Papyrus shouted. No threats to dust Sans or even fight him. Already, Frisk suspected this Papyrus would never do such a thing or even think about it.

With a mighty "Nyehehehe—heh!", Papyrus marched away.

"OK, you can come out now. You oughta get going," Sans said, while Frisk leaped to their feet and stood head and shoulders above the warped lampshade. He winked. "Or sit through more of my hilarious jokes."

"Thank you," said Frisk, nodding before taking off in a full sprint. In the midst of the dark, biting cold, a hopeful smile spread on their lips. Maybe this run would be alright, after all. They hurried down the snowy path so fast that they heard nothing but the muffled echo of Sans' voice as they left.

Meanwhile, farther ahead, Vivaldi and Verdana crouched behind a wooden sentry station, careful to avoid a spotted dog that stood a stone's throw away. They watched while, grunting as he finished his smoke break, Doggo crushed his charred dog treat into the snow beside the many blackened treats that were scattered at his feet. The twins recalled their mother's guidance, stayed in skeleton form, and teleported past him.

Since it was much easier to teleport, however, an extra burst of power shot through the barrettes and threw the twins smack into an Icecap, knocking off his hat. The twins fell backward onto their pelvic bones and gasped as the monster in front of them shifted from a gnome into a simple ice cube. "Aah! Sorry!"

But the Ice, comfortable with his identity, hummed a tune and hopped out of sight.

Every time Frisk tried to hurry forward and close whatever gap remained between them and their children, Papyrus and Sans intercepted them with another puzzle. Each delay cranked up Frisk's worry for the twins to the point they wondered if death in this reality would come from a heart attack.

Frisk's nerves calmed somewhat once they attracted some brief fights from the local forest denizens, but heard nothing from these monsters about their twins. If Viv and Ver had escaped notice, they were safe. After Frisk encountered the Dogi and a few slippery, but harmless puzzles, they tripped and fell down a steep, yet soft snowbank and was greeted at the bottom by two little skeletons, their buttercup barrettes stuck to their foreheads like magnets.

"Hi, Mommy," Verdana said, waving morosely. He would have pouted if he had lips. "We can't get out."

"This puzzle's too hard," Vivaldi explained, a pained expression on her skull. "We keep shortcutting wrong and falling."

Frisk promptly scrambled over to the twins and smothered them with kisses. When their heart stopped pounding with maternal fear and they could breathe again, they recognized an odd pair of snowmen.

"Is that really Uncle Papyrus?" Verdana said, poking a muscular snowman that wore a familiar red scarf. The Papyrus he knew would have added spiked armor, if not actual weapons.

"And that's sad, even for Daddy," Vivaldi said, pointing at the lump she sat on with 'Sans' written on it in red marker. Last winter, Daddy had put off his usual nap to help her build a snowman. The best part was when he lifted her high on his shoulders to add a carrot nose.

"I met them," Frisk said, with a chuckle, "and they're both funny and kind." Recalling Papyrus' frozen spaghetti and the puzzle he had 'improved' by shaping it like himself, they wiggled a 'Y' hand in front of their face. _Silly._ "I think we'll be okay."

"Can we tell them, Mommy?" Vivaldi asked, after a moment. "Maybe they know Dr. Alphys."

With a sigh, Frisk murmured, "I don't know. Toriel believed us, but…."

"Hold on!" Verdana said, returning to human form and rubbing his belly. As if on cue, his stomach rumbled. "I'm hungry."

"There's food in town," Frisk said, brushing the snow off their legs. "We just have to make it there."

'Making it there' was easier than it seemed once they passed the slick ice and switch puzzle. All that remained were a couple of odd monsters; the Greater Dog barked with delight at Vivaldi and Verdana's vigorous petting, and the Gryftrot was merely grumpy over being decorated against his will. After the Gryftrot thanked the family for freeing him of ornaments and scampered off, Frisk thought that they glimpsed Sans at the entrance of a nearby cave. But then, they did a double-take, and Sans was gone.

Once they reached a long, rickety bridge and spotted Sans waiting with Papyrus on the other side, they figured they had just imagined it. Or at least, they hoped so. Why would the Sans of this world follow them?

However, they were grateful that Papyrus, far from being startled or suspicious, was thrilled to suddenly see _three_ humans to capture instead of one. With a flourish, he quickly scrapped the Gauntlet of Deadly Terror, his foolproof trap of cannons, blades, fire, and a doggie, as lacking class. When Papyrus left, Frisk prodded the children forward. Almost there.

But then, Sans blocked their path. "Heya."

Frisk's protective instinct surged and they pulled the children close.

"Thought I saw three of you come through the door," Sans said, shrugging. "Gotta admit, your disappearing act was great."

"I'm sorry," Frisk said, grasping the twins' shoulders tightly.

"No prob. Thanks for helping out my super cool bro. For a second there, I wasn't sure you'd heard me," Sans said, the lights in his eye sockets wandering to the side, looking either at nothing or at the chasm beneath them. "He's really been wanting to get into the Royal Guard."

"He's not captain—?!" said Frisk, wincing and cursing themselves once they realized their mistake.

"Nah, still in training. Paps mentioned it a few times already. Unless you know something I don't for some reason I don't." Sans put his hands in his pockets, his smile cemented in place. "Like dropping in from an alternate reality?"

Frisk's breath hitched. The twins huddled together.

"So." Sans glared at them. "It _was_ you."


	5. Skele-ton

Sans stood still and silent, waiting for the humans to answer. Wind howled in the depths beneath the frosty bridge that bordered Snowdin Town.

Shuddering, Frisk saw that a mere two or three more wooden planks stood between the twins and solid ground.

"Like I told ya, I don't care about catching humans. And I can sorta deal with timelines jumping left and right," Sans said, poised at the edge of the bridge, barring the way with his slippered feet spread apart. "But even I have to get off my tailbone when someone rips a hole to get here from somewhenwhere."

Frisk bit their lip.

"Look. Since you finally brought these kids out of hiding," Sans continued, his expression unreadable, "mind telling me the truth?"

"...It's okay, Mommy," Vivaldi said, softly, taking a step away from them and toward Sans.

"Don't worry about us," said Verdana, joining her.

Before Frisk could stop them, the twins clasped their hands together, disappeared, and then reappeared behind Sans. Sensing the sudden shift in their presence, he turned around and was greeted by their matching, pointy toothed smiles. A moment later, and they both turned into skeletons. What threw Sans off most was the scar below Verdana's left eye and above Vivaldi's right. Taking his speechless distraction as an opportunity, Frisk slipped past Sans and held the twins once more.

"They're hybrids. We're from another Mt. Ebott. Our barrier's broken," said Frisk, crossing their pointer fingers and then spreading them apart in the sign for ' _different_ ', "but there was an accident with their magic."

Vivaldi mused, "Our world's kinda the same."

"But not really," said Verdana.

"We're traveling to Hotland," Frisk said, patting the twins' scapulae. "Trying to go home."

After staring at them for what felt like an eternity, Sans said, "You hungry? I know a place."

"Grillby's!" the twins cheered, returning to human form and pumping their fists in the air. Their sharp teeth glinted like the crystalline snow.

Sans shook his skull. The kids knew Grillby's.

What a day.

* * *

Once Sans led Frisk and the twins into Grillby's, Verdana and Vivaldi marveled at how many people knew Sans. Their father was nowhere near as comfortable as this guy around crowds. The kids smiled at each other, deciding that they liked this Sans. He found them a booth, but Frisk could not keep Verdana from wriggling under the table until he popped up between Sans and the wall, eager to sit beside him. Then, when Grillby approached, Verdana jumped to his knees, pointed at the bartender's flaming head, and said, "You're orange?!"

"Say you're sorry, or no dessert," Frisk said, unsure whether this Grillby's even had dessert. With Verdana's bottomless stomach, however, the warning was always effective.

"Sorry, Uncle Grillby," Verdana mumbled, sliding back into his seat.

Sans blinked at that, but relayed their order of three burgers and one basket of fries. Then, as Grillby left with his head sparking in jollity, Sans propped his chin on his hand and peered across the table. The condiments were missing.

Without a word, Frisk got up, smiled sweetly at a fish monster by the bar, and asked for a pair of bottles. Returning to the table, they held the ketchup and slid the bottle of mustard toward Sans.

"Uh, not for nothing," Sans said, amused, "but who puts mustard on fries?"

The other three stared.

"What?"

They kept staring.

"Mind passing the ketchup?" Sans said, handing the mustard back to Frisk. Stunned, Frisk passed the ketchup to Sans as his fries arrived. Ignoring them, Sans opened the bottle's lid and let his fries drown in an ocean of red tomato.

Doubling over with giggles, Frisk laughed so hard they could not move. Tears pricked Verdana's eyes as the boy howled, and his sister started to hiccup.

"Should invite you guys to my stand-up comedy show," said Sans, taking a swig of ketchup straight from the bottle. He then lifted his shirt and used the glass bottle to play his ribcage like a xylophone. "Too easy to _tickle your ribs_."

After they left and walked to the eastern end of Snowdin, Sans paused at his front door. "Just remember my bro's special attack. Think of a blue stop sign."

"We'll stay determined," said Vivaldi. She and Verdana grinned up at their mother.

"Huh, right," Sans said. Then, he entered the house and closed the door.

The twins faces fell somewhat as they left Snowdin and marched into a thickening fog. All the multicolored lights, trees, and presents made it feel like a Christmas town. Verdana asked, "What's our Snowdin like?"

"This one is much nicer," Frisk said, also feeling sadness prick them while walking away from such a cheerful, welcoming place. Maybe this is what wintry towns in their world could become now that monsters were free. They gave a wistful sigh. "But only home is home."

"Don't worry, Mommy. When we get home," Vivaldi said, gripping their hand tenderly, "I'll play 'Twinkle Twinkle' on my violin for you, okay?"

"And then Daddy will make his kissy faces at you," Verdana said, sticking out his tongue like the very thought was poisonous.

Frisk laughed.

"HUMANS!"

Papyrus stood in the gap between them and Waterfall, struck a dramatic pose, and let his red scarf flutter in the cavern breeze. Raising his voice like he was about to perform a soliloquy, he began, "Allow me to tell you about some complex feelings."

Vivaldi and Verdana blinked.

"Papyrus," Frisk said, walking up to him before he could continue his speech, "would you mind if we stayed with you tonight?"

"You—you mean I can capture you?!" Papyrus grasped his rosy cheekbones, stars sparkling in his eyes. "Wowie! Now Undyne will finally let me into the Royal Guard!" He rushed toward Frisk and shook their hand with excitement. "This is the best day of my life! Until Undyne brings me into the Royal Guard, of course. Then _that_ will be the best day of my life! Come with me, humans!"

The twins trudged along at Frisk's side, dragging their shoes through the snow while Papyrus sang his own praises. Though they felt nervous, they trusted their mother. Besides, this Papyrus was bossy and full of himself but, unlike their uncle, would not hurt a fly. The weight of adventure crashed in on them and, as much as they fought to stay awake, they needed sleep. Drowsiness dragged their eyelids down until, before they knew it, their mother's arms had lifted them and tucked them into soft, warm blankets.

* * *

Yawning, Verdana and Vivaldi rubbed their groggy eyes and sat up. Their mussed hair was pasted to their foreheads, annoying them all the more because they could not take off their stupid barrettes. The spacious, brightly colored bed they shared was carved into a strange shape. A racecar?

"Cool!" Verdana cried, his throat raspy from sleep. "Whose room is this?"

Vivaldi looked down at herself. She was wearing an oversized t-shirt of a fluffy bunny. Verdana, on the other hand, wore a black shirt with a skull and crossbones. A similar flag decorated the wall. In the room's far corner was a desktop computer, and beside the bed stood a table of action figures. Overall, it was neat and tidy. "Maybe it's Uncle Papyrus' room."

Verdana climbed down, padded across the floor, and picked up a slender action figure with golden stripes that looked like a sexy Transformer. "Whoa."

If their uncle were here, he would dump all those 'useless' figures in the trash. Or position them on a grid to display battle strategies.

Tiptoeing downstairs, the twins found their mother was still sleeping, curled up on the sofa with a downy comforter. Papyrus snored on the floor behind the sofa under a makeshift tent, cradling a half-empty bowl of popcorn like a teddy bear. They suspected that they had missed a really fun sleepover party.

"Morning, kids," came a voice from the kitchen. The children walked into the room to spy Sans sitting on the kitchen counter and munching a large bag of popato chisps.

The twins glanced at each other and shrugged. It was tough deciding what to call this guy. Every name felt weird. Finally, they said, "Morning!"

The skeleton swallowed his chisps and asked, "You hungry?"

"Yeah," said Verdana. "You got spaghetti, right?"

"All we got left," Sans said, tossing a chisp in the air that missed his mouth and fell on the floor. A small pile of sad failures gained another chisp below Sans' dangling slippers. "Unless you want these. Don't think your ma would go for that, though."

"We love spaghetti. Right, Ver?" Vivaldi said, walking past Sans to the refrigerator.

"Paps keeps the old ones in there. Freshest batch is on top of the sink," Sans said, eyeing the twins, "but I don't think you can reach it. Even my coolest bro has to stand on tip-phalange."

"Wait, Viv, I'll help!" Verdana said, skipping to his sister's side. Thanks to Papyrus' ankle-length shirt, he looked like a tiny pirate. When Vivaldi took his hand, he pointed up at a clear, plastic container with a ridged lid that sat on the sink's countertop, just visible from where the cabinet stretched to the ceiling. "Up there."

"Uh huh," Vivaldi said, taking on a stern look.

At first, nothing happened. But then, as Sans watched, a soft, red light surrounded the container and lifted it. With care, it began to slide forward until the twins held it in midair. But then, it began to wobble.

"Uh oh!" cried Verdana. The container swung to and fro as if the children were staggering under its weight. The boy shot his free hand toward it.

Vivaldi gasped. "No, Ver!"

The barrettes flamed wildly, launching the pasta container in a wide arc up and over the twins' heads before hurtling it to the ground upside-down.

 _SPLAT!_

Spaghetti bounced from the burst container and splattered in all directions. Noodles rocketed against the furniture and walls while chunky, red sauce pooled on the floor. But as Viv and Ver stared in dismay at the mess, they also could not get their magic to stop crumpling the container into the floor.

Blue suddenly dominated their red. Rather than blending into purple, the blue gently pried the red away, like peeling off their magical fingers one by one. Soon, the light from their barrettes faded; the spaghetti container lost all trace of magic, red or blue, and stayed on the floor, unmoving. When the twins looked back at Sans, he had already picked up his popato chisp bag and resumed eating.

Blushing, the twins eased their hands apart and cringed. "Oops."

"S'ok, you'll _catch_ on," Sans said, tossing yet another chisp in the air and missing completely. "Who gave you those hair clips, anyway?"

"Our Dr. Alphys," Vivaldi said, pouting and struggling to remove the offending barrette from her hair. "Daddy says she wants to expect on us."

"...Experiment, huh?" Sans said.

"Yeah. She promised Mommy to be nice to us," said Verdana. He made his way to the pasta explosion, knelt, and sighed. "But she lied."

"The Alphys I know would hate herself." Sans slid off the counter and stuck his greasy hands in his pockets. "Lemme guess. You think she can help you get home?"

"Yup," Vivaldi said, climbing onto the counter beside Sans to grab a sponge and towel.

"Never mind, kid, I'll get it," Sans said, shuffling across the kitchen floor and ignoring the saucy tracks he made. He reached behind the sink and grabbed a mop. "Go get Paps, okay?"

Vivaldi's hair hid her face. She nodded, hopped off the counter, and ran from the room.

"She misses Daddy," Verdana explained, scraping pasta back into the container with his bare hands. Each scoop of spaghetti smacked the plastic with a _splurt_. "He calls her 'sweetpea'."

Sans stared past Verdana into the living room, where Vivaldi was shaking Papyrus awake while Frisk sat up and yawned. "Oh."


	6. Waterfall

"Don't worry, I'm sure Undyne will understand!" Papyrus said, standing beside his brother in the doorway and waving his human guests goodbye with both hands. Papyrus had insisted on cooking a fresh batch of spaghetti for breakfast after cleaning what he could of the twins' accident; he wore checkered oven mitts, a poofy chef's hat, and a polka dot apron that read 'Kiss the Cook'. "After all, we're friends!"

The twins shifted irritably for some reason.

"Prolly bump into you guys later," Sans said, stretching his spine until it cracked several times, earning him a glare from Papyrus. Suddenly, he grabbed Frisk's hand and said, "First, gotta _grab_ a word with ya."

In a flash, Frisk found themselves alone with Sans in a narrow, tiled room. As always, the teleport punched the pit of Frisk's stomach, and the human gagged. They clamped a hand over their mouth but, to their surprise, the wave of nausea passed a split second later. That was new.

"You okay?" Sans asked, sweat beading on his skull.

"Better than usual," Frisk murmured, taking in the strange room. Its pale, fluorescent lighting revealed illegible blueprints on a side counter near a massive, cloth-covered structure. A machine? "Where are we?"

"Sorry, no _time_ to explain," Sans said, winking. "Wanted to tell ya I think the kids' magic acted up because they got scared." He put his hands in his pockets and peered at Frisk. "That happen a lot?"

"Sometimes, but usually it's weak," Frisk said, shaking their head.

"...Thing is, I plan to keep an eyesocket out for ya, but this ain't your world." Sans paused. "Can you handle Undyne?"

"Yes." Dread filled Frisk at facing any Underground's captain of the Royal Guard, but the answer rolled off their tongue. "I can."

Sans' jolly grin stayed in place, but the lights of his eyes softened. "Your world's tougher than this one, huh?"

Frisk glanced down at their sleeves. In their Underground, years ago, hundreds of buttercups had covered their face and protruded from their wrists. Here, they had made it through Snowdin without the twins resetting at all. They would protect their children with their own body. They had to. Looking back at Sans, they replied, "Yes."

"Gotcha. And sorry," Sans said, taking Frisk's hand once more. They reappeared at the front door. Then, wincing an apology when Frisk gagged again, Sans vanished.

"Before my brother so rudely interrupted me," Papyrus declared with a bright smile, his hands on his pelvis, "as I was saying, The Great Papyrus cannot be wrong. Call me anytime!"

Vivaldi and Verdana trotted alongside Frisk as they departed. Despite their striped sweaters and matching Manly Bandannas, they shivered in the cold. Frisk assured them that the temperatures so far matched those in their world; Waterfall would be much warmer. When Papyrus disappeared into his house and out of earshot, however, the twins scowled. "Uncle Papyrus said you dated him last night! How could you cheat on Daddy?"

"It wasn't like that," Frisk said, crossing their frosty arms. They had debated changing clothes, but hoped against hope that someone from their world might arrive and recognize them, not that they would say this to the children.

"Uncle Papyrus used a dating book and everything," spat Verdana, kicking a dent into a large snowball, though it was actually a snowdecahedron. "And he showed you his coolest clothes!"

"He said you liked him," added Vivaldi with a frown, huffing so the air around her dainty nose fogged up. "He had to _ask_ to just be friends."

"He misunderstood," Frisk mumbled, leaving out the details of their battle strategy. A light blush tinged their cheeks. Considering their brother-in-law's workaholic attitude, they had not expected flirting with this world's Papyrus to be so effective.

They soon crossed the foggy border from Snowdin into Waterfall. Frisk hustled the children through a glittering cavern where the walls narrowed into dim tunnels with embedded crystals that shed a soft glow, like starlight. Near a vacant sentry station, several monsters milled around, blinking at the newcomers with curiosity. A familiar monster kid with a yellow striped shirt tried to approach them, but Frisk stayed on task and kept the twins moving.

The path soon led them into a patch of high brush. As they pushed through, reached its edge and entered a clearing, Frisk felt a fiery stare pierce the darkness; in a flash, they dropped to the ground, grabbed the twins' shoulders to pull them back into the shelter of the tall grass, and held their breath. An armored knight lurked in the distance, scouring the area with a penetrating gaze. Alerted by the rustling grass, the knight halted and took several, clanking steps closer.

"H-hi, Undyne!" cried Papyrus, his echoes growing louder as he ran along a parallel path toward his captain-to-be. When he reached Undyne, she grunted her displeasure and put her hands on her hips. He apologized for being late, but explained that he had to scrub his kitchen and do a last-minute load of laundry, since he was far too cool to leave his house filthy, and it was required discipline for the Royal Guard, after all. In the confusion, the hidden humans took their chance to slip away. Papyrus' voice faded until it disappeared completely. "Uhhh, regarding that human I called you about earlier…."

Once the family reached the bridge seeds, planted them, and dashed across, they reached safety and slowed down. Vivaldi clutched her mother's hand and looked behind them at the lonely road. _...Aunt Undyne?_

"Look!" Verdana cried excitedly, pulling Vivaldi by the elbow and out of her thoughts toward a cave wall lined with plaques. The mounted plaques, as the little boy read them aloud, told of the monsters' oppression by the humans and their journey deeper into Mt. Ebott.

"Mommy, do we have signs like these?" asked Vivaldi, running her little fingertips along a plaque's bottom edge.

"...I don't think we used to," Frisk said, not ready to explain that they had been half-blind and almost dead by the time they first entered Waterfall. But they smiled, held out two fingers, and moved them down, up, and down again. _History._ "But we do now."

"' _Why did the humans attack? Indeed, it seemed they had nothing to fear_ '," Vivaldi read. Glancing sidelong, her eyes met Verdana's, and the twins nodded. Agreeing on their unspoken question, Vivaldi turned toward Frisk and said, "Is Aunt Undyne going to fight us?"

Frisk gazed back while water dripped from the ceiling. Drip, drip. Drop. "...I won't let her hurt you."

"But _why_?" cried Verdana, his face screwed up in frustration. "We didn't do anything wrong!"

"Monsters just want to go to the surface, sweetie," Frisk said. They ruffled his hair gently. "Like we want to go home."

"Then, is that flower right?" Vivaldi asked. "Are we going to die?"

"Flowey said that to be stronger, we need LOVE," Verdana said. Then, he squirmed. "But Daddy says that LOVE comes from killing people."

Frisk looked down into their children's wide, crimson eyes, and swallowed hard. _Flowey…._ They took a breath and knelt, drawing the twins closer. "When someone fights you, do you want to hurt them?"

Both twins shook their heads.

"Then always be kind," Frisk said, giving them a small smile. "That's what makes you strong."

Though Vivaldi and Verdana could not smile back, they nodded.

As the family continued into Waterfall, the road ahead became a dim boardwalk that rose above a pitch black abyss. There was no way for Frisk to figure out how deep it went, so they prodded the twins to walk faster. They thought they spied a small monster running ahead, but it certainly was not Undyne.

All was still and quiet. Too quiet.

Finally, after passing more tall brush, the three of them reached a lovely marsh and gazed in amazement at the luminescent pools and flora. Glowing, blue plants that Frisk recognized as Echo Flowers lined their dark path through the gurgling waters. A passing conversation reached their ears.

 _'So? Don't you have any wishes to make?'_ _'...Hmm, just one, but it's kind of stupid.'_

Frisk mused that the monsters of this world dared to hope, to make wishes on sparkling ceiling stones while longing for the stars. Perhaps that was what made this Underground different. The human wondered if their Waterfall looked as beautiful as this one now that the poisonous algae had been cleared out. They would have to find out when they got home.

To be on the safe side, anyway, Frisk tried to keep Verdana from playing in the water. After meeting a chatty, yet lonely octopus named Onionsan and the adorable Shyren, however, Verdana was so excited they could no longer restrain him from jumping into every puddle. Ahead, water dripped from the ceiling like rhythmic rain, bringing back a bittersweet memory.

Frisk looked around. Might it be here?

At first, the twins ignored the moss-covered stone statue they passed; Verdana was too busy playing, and Vivaldi was too busy nagging at her brother to stop splashing around. Suddenly, a haunting melody tinkled through the air. The twins turned and saw Frisk placing an umbrella firmly in the statue's hand.

Vivaldi walked over and tugged Frisk's sleeve. "How'd you know?"

"The statue in our Waterfall is just like this," Frisk said, their eyes misting as the song echoed down the corridor. Once upon a time, while Flowey fussed over them and Sans carried them on his back, this crumbling statue and its music box had been their last, feverish sight before they died, reset, and woke up blind. "Same music."

"Wow. Really?" Verdana breathed, mesmerized by the thought. "The same?"

"Mm hmm." Memories flooded Frisk's soul. Time had once been a rough hand shoving them off a cliff over, and over, and over, farther, and farther, and farther into nothing. Frisk ran delicate fingers through Vivaldi and Verdana's hair as the children hugged their legs and watched the statue, enchanted by its music. A tear trickled down Frisk's cheek as they thought of Sans, but they tugged their lips into a gentle smile. "Same but different."

Not long after they resumed walking, they approached a natural archway. The small lizard with a yellow striped shirt, the one they had passed earlier, noticed the umbrellas they carried and called out to the three strangers. "Yo, you got an umbrella? Awesome!"

At that, Frisk remembered first meeting the monster child in Snowdin. Since the child had no arms with which to hold an umbrella, Frisk quickly made space for them. Turned out the monster kid was a huge fan of Undyne, so when Verdana slipped and called her 'Aunt Undyne', the kid flipped out.

"Man, she's your aunt?! That's beyond the coolest cool!" the monster cried, their round eyes beaming with starry wonder. "She beats up bad guys and _never_ loses. I'd wet the bed every night if I was a human!"

"She can be really scary, but she's nice and plays with us," Vivaldi said, twirling her scarlet umbrella. Playtime usually involved Undyne bench pressing the twins.

"Of course!" said the monster kid, bursting into a wide, toothy grin. "She's too cool to ever hurt an innocent person."

Frisk kept silent. At this, so did Verdana.

When they reached a steep ledge and Frisk tried giving their new, young friend a boost, the monster kid could not quite reach Viv and Ver's outstretched arms. Frisk reluctantly agreed when the kid offered to stay behind and find another route since, if Undyne was nearby, chances were it was safer for them to separate. The child fell smack on their face, got up, and ran away.

A minute later, the phone rang. It was Papyrus. The twins grumbled, still jealous for their father's sake, when Frisk answered it.

"Awhile ago, a certain friend asked me what you were wearing," said Papyrus cheerily, as if chatting with Frisk about the weather. "However, her opinion of you is very—murdery."

"Eh?!" cried the twins as Frisk cringed. The dull receiver in Toriel's old phone muffled Papyrus, but not well enough.

"So! I made sure to say you were _not_ wearing a dusty tutu and _were_ wearing a fancy, silky vest with the Royal Crest on it," Papyrus continued in a musical tone. Frisk's jaw dropped. "You see, I was sure you would find and change into new clothes. Or someone else's old clothes. Being friends with everyone is easy!"

 _Click._

Sighing, Frisk shook their head and flashed their children a warm, confident grin. They had to get ready. "Change form, okay?"

The twins transformed into skeletons, but then stared at the ground, sullen.

 _Shoooom!_

A flash of blue, thrust by an unseen hand, pierced the darkness and embedded itself in the boardwalk between Frisk and the children. It remained solid for a split second before vanishing.

A spear.


	7. Determination

Undyne burst from the shadows in thick, gleaming armor, her hair flying above her helmet like a scarlet plume. Forming another spear—no, spear _s_ —in her hand, Undyne aimed three at a time, converged their points in midair, and fired with ferocity. Frisk shoved their yelping children away and shielded them with their red, human soul. A barrage of spears then splintered off from the three, and Frisk leaped backward, desperately rolling out of their path.

"Run!" Frisk cried, staggering to their feet just in time to dodge another set of hurled spears before charging headlong deeper into Waterfall.

Verdana and Vivaldi forced themselves to break away from their mother and run in the opposite direction. Though this meant running toward Undyne at top speed, the captain of the Royal Guard bypassed them and stayed on Frisk's trail, firing spear after spear through the boardwalk at the slim, agile human. The young skeletons seemed not to exist to her. Maybe Papyrus had told her there was one human, not three.

The children ran and ran until their joints burned. Once they reached the marsh they had crossed earlier, however, they struggled to remember which winding path they had taken. They glanced at each other and their eyes' red lights flared with fear. So did their barrettes; in fact, their bodies pulsed with magic. How far from their mother had they run?

"Where'd we go?" said Verdana, rolling up his black sweater sleeves above his forearm bones.

Vivaldi brushed her metacarpals against the cave walls. The path was dark, but present, and now visible thanks to the magical glow emanating from the twins. She took Verdana by the elbow and led him forward, sparking his curiosity enough for him to eagerly follow. Soon, around a bend, the cheerful light of a save star welcomed them through an open archway.

But then, the twins blinked at what else they saw. A village?

"hOI!! im temmie!!!" barked a doglike creature with floppy ears, a tiny mouth, and a perpetual sugar high.

"im temmie!!!" said another.

"im temmie!!!" said a third. "don forget my friend!"

The fourth grinned. "I'm Bob."

If this place could be called a town or village, it was by far the weirdest. A rough-hewn statue of Tem stood beside a ramshackle shop entrance while various Temmies trotted to and fro, except for one of them, who hid behind a crack in the wall. Nearby, a single mushroom performed an interpretive dance.

The twins felt...something. Detemmined?

"Let's save!" said Verdana, snapping out of it and pointing at the golden star.

"No, wait!" cried Vivaldi, yanking her arm away from her brother. "We don't know if Mommy's okay! What if A-Aunt Undyne…?"

"Mommy's fine. I know it," Verdana said, his voice firm, though his hair clip flamed. He held out his bony hand to Vivaldi as the Temmies tilted their heads, puzzled. "We'll go save 'em. Right?"

"Right. Let's save Mommy," said Vivaldi, her jawbone set with determination. She reached to touch the save star with Verdana.

Leaving the Temmie Village behind, the twins regained their bearings and ran back the way they came. When Vivaldi began to stumble, however, the siblings paused to rest on the corner of a warped pier. Other than the distant grunts of a flexing Aaron, all was quiet and still. Even the Echo Flowers were silent.

Splash!

The twins spun to their left. In a patch of soil amid water sausages sprang a flower that sent shivers up the twins' spines. Ripples of water reflected blue on the flower's extending vines and golden petals.

Flowey smiled. "Howdy~"

"Go away!" Verdana shouted, frowning and clenching his fists as he aimed a score of razor sharp bones at Flowey. He had more than enough of this flower picking on his mom and sis, and now, his mom was in trouble far away in the middle of Waterfall. The last thing the boy wanted or needed was for this meanie to get in his way. "Leave us alone!"

"Sure, kid." Flowey laughed. Lowering his eyelids, he said, "I came here to help you out, but if you want to chase me away again—"

"Wait, you know us?" said Vivaldi, fidgeting with her barrette. Back home, most of her prank improvements played upon people not recognizing them as either humans or monsters, even while wearing the same clothes.

"Kinda hard to forget hybrid monster-humans. Boy, did you surprise me back in the Ruins. I've never seen _anything_ like your souls," said Flowey, sickening sweetness creeping into his voice as he rested his blossom on his leaf and narrowed his eyes at the skeletal twins. "You kinda remind me of that smiley trashbag. Hmm…."

Suddenly, Flowey lashed out a vine and yanked Verdana upside-down by his ankle, raising and dangling him helplessly high above the waters.

" _VER!_ " cried Vivaldi, magic bursting through her whole body. Then, a large, oblong skull appeared above the shocked girl and aimed its gaping maw at Flowey. For a split second, the cavern itself erupted in a blaze of red as the blaster fired.

Flowey lowered Verdana and slipped beneath the waves just in time to spare his main blossom. Splashing through the surface once more, he eyed his burnt, shriveled vines and tsked. "Hey, watch it," he chided, smirking. "You almost killed me~!"

Vivaldi collapsed onto the ground, trembling, as Verdana crawled to her side. Her blaster vanished. Then, the twins stared at Flowey, their orbits wide with horror.

"Now that I got your attention, listen up. Your mom's the only obvious human, right?" said Flowey, easing closer to the twins and lifting their quaking chins with his charred leaves. "Too bad. No wonder Undyne's out there stealing their soul."

"You saw Mommy?!" cried Vivaldi and Verdana in unison.

"Yup. That fish lady's probably skewering them as we speak," Flowey continued, bobbing on his stem as his eyes twinkled. "Oopsie!" he said, sticking out his tongue, "Those clips of yours are glowing again."

It was true. The more the twins shook with fear and anger, the brighter their crystal buttercups shined. And though the power felt much too big to control, it also felt strong. Very strong.

"...You _could_ use that magic to fight Undyne, if you wanted to. Not like she'll ever give up otherwise. Take my advice, kids," Flowey said, with a broad, cheerful grin. "Down here, it's kill or be killed."

Before the twins could so much as rattle their bones at Flowey, he retracted his vines, sank into the boggy soil, and disappeared. Left alone, the twins huddled together while Vivaldi stared at the damp ground. Both knew exactly what had happened.

"V-Ver," Vivaldi stammered, "I…."

"Uncle Papyrus woulda loved it," Verdana said, elbowing her.

"Really?" Vivaldi glanced at him, still numb.

"Yeah. Come on," said Verdana, waiting for his sister to nod and helping her to stand. "Mom's waiting!"

Vivaldi and Verdana raced to retrace their steps, their worry speeding them past the spot from which they first ran away. This time, they ran so fast that they tripped over a loose plank on a narrow, slippery bridge and collided with something that turned out to be a someone: the monster kid from earlier. When the twins fell forward, the lizard child fell back, tumbled onto their torso, rolled over the side, and grabbed the wooden edge with their teeth.

Dull clanks of heavy armor rang in the distance. Undyne?

The monster kid was slipping. There was no time. Turning human, Vivaldi and Verdana dashed to the kid's side and bent forward to brace their friend's round head in their soft hands. At the same time, the twins propped the kid's feet with magic and, straining to keep it in control, helped the frightened kid scramble to safety.

Before the twins could apologize for the accident, however, Undyne appeared. Up close, she was nowhere near the size of the giant monster they knew from their world, but she still loomed large and imposing, her movements graceful and lethal.

And Frisk was missing.

Just then, the monster kid wedged their body between the twins and their idol. "Yo...you said to stay away, U-Undyne, but—but they're my friends!"

Undyne halted with poise more like a statue than a living monster. Her hair fluttered in the wind. Then, to the children's collective shock, she backed away.

"Hey, is Undyne right?" the monster kid asked, once the three of them were alone and could catch their breath. "She said your mom's a human. But you just used magic!"

Vivaldi and Verdana gave each other a long look.

"We're humans," said Vivaldi, nodding, " _and_ monsters."

"Our mom's human. Dad's a monster. See?" Verdana turned his hand from flesh to bone and back. "That's why we had to run away."

"...Okay." The monster kid, their decision made, clenched their jaw and nodded. "Let's go find your mom!"

It did not take long at all. Soon, the children skidded to a halt before the black shadow of a massive peak—except for the monster kid, who faceplanted. Viv and Ver helped their friend up and took in the scene: Undyne flinged off her helmet in frustration and berated Frisk about disgracing flowery swordswomen and hiding behind disguised monster children. Finally, she demanded that their mother enter battle with her when ready.

"Ver! Over there!" Vivaldi shouted, pointing to a glowing star that Frisk was leaving behind. "Hurry!"

As their monster friend watched, puzzled, the twins ran toward the narrow passage, held hands, and touched the invisible save point together, feeling health and life flow into them. Then, they ran ahead in tandem and waved their friend a grateful goodbye. Magic surged through them in their urgency, letting them teleport in several short hops toward their mother, though the extra bursts of power hurtled them too far, making it their turn to fall flat on their faces.

Lifting their heads, they saw that Frisk was already weak, struggling to deflect Undyne's arrows while being pinned by her green power, and that they kept getting hit—once, twice, three times, more—but Undyne would not stop. This was not Aunt Undyne, but it seemed _any_ Undyne refused to back down from a fight.

Maybe the flower was right, after all. Some people would not stop fighting. Not until you made them stop.

Verdana reached into his pocket and drew out the Toy Knife he had found in the Ruins. Vivaldi nodded. This would take all their strength and focus. Changing to monster form, they rushed forward, cupped their mouths, and shouted.

"HEY!"

Undyne flinched and Frisk gasped in shock as the twin skeletons, aflame with red magic, suddenly appeared between them. Vivaldi plunged a heart-shaped border of bones into the ground while, in a flash, Verdana grabbed the Toy Knife and carved a pair of names:

'Undyne Alphys'

"Sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G!" cried Verdana and Vivaldi in sing-song. "First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes—"

"H-hey, punks!" Undyne sputtered, gnashing her teeth as her cheeks flushed, "Quit it!"

"We'll never quit!" Returning to human form but still glowing with crimson monster magic, they said, "Leave our mommy alone!"

Undyne grasped in her gauntlet another green spear that she was ready to hurl at Frisk, but at the twins' transformation, she balked. This was nothing like a disguise. Frisk took that moment to grab the children and run.

"Come back here!" Undyne growled, following them toward a distant, fiery corridor, certain only that the final human Asgore needed was getting away. Her heavy armor slowed her down, but not as much as the weight of her quarry's two children. Undyne kept running, inching closer. "Nnnngggaaaaahhhhh!"

"Mommy, we're in Hotland!" yelled Vivaldi as they dashed past a giant marquee. The cavern walls now reflected bright orange lava. Immediately, the phone rang in Frisk's pocket. Verdana picked it up while his mother was busy fleeing for their lives.

"I was just thinking—" It was Uncle Papyrus. "—you, me, and Undyne should all hang out sometime! I think you would make great pals!"

Before the stunned child could say a word, Papyrus hung up.

A second after they cleared a vacant, snow- covered sentry station and crossed the bridge into Hotland, a massive thud and clang of armor sounded behind them. Did Undyne trip and fall? When Frisk set the twins on the ground, they saw that Undyne was prone and baking inside her hot armor. Behind them, Frisk spotted a strangely placed but necessary water cooler. Vivaldi rushed to fill cups and hand them to her brother, Verdana passed them to Frisk, and then, Frisk poured a small river of cool water over Undyne's face and armor to bring her relief.

Dragging herself upright, yet still dizzy from heat exhaustion, Undyne looked intently at the apparent humans. A minute before, she was certain the adult in front of her had kidnapped monster children, disguised them as humans, and posed as their mother in a pathetic bid for sympathy, avoiding their duty to yield their human soul to Asgore and free monsterkind.

Now she had doubts.

Water dripped from Undyne's ponytail and a lump rose in her throat as she locked her eye with Frisk's. The human's soft, pleading gaze was not for themselves; it was for the children—monsters? humans?—who clung to their shaking legs. Blushing with shame, Undyne grit her teeth, turned on her heel, and staggered home.

Frisk then sank to their knees, gasping for breath. The twins hugged their mother's arms until they all recovered. Then, Frisk pressed the children against their chest and murmured, "I am so, _so_ proud of you."


	8. Hotland

"Hope the Alphys here is nice," Vivaldi mumbled, grasping Frisk's sleeve with her sweaty palm. The remaining walk from the Hotland entrance to the lab was short, but blazing hot enough to evaporate the cups the twins took from the water cooler as soon as they left it behind. "I'm thirsty again."

"Think she's got juice boxes?" Verdana mused, swinging his arms back and forth to clap his hands while switching between flesh and bone. _Slap, clack, clack, slap!_

"Juice is too sticky," Vivaldi said, sticking out her tongue with distaste.

"What about Nice Cream?" said Verdana, hopping on one foot and beaming. "We still got some, right?"

Frisk nodded, amazed as they drew the bars from their pockets that the 'frozen treat that warms your heart' had not melted at all. The slogan held true, too, since the wrappers were printed with nice messages, like 'Love yourself! I love you!' As Frisk handed Verdana a Nice Cream that read 'Is this as sweet as you?', they passed two knights guarding a side tunnel, their black armor a stark contrast against the burnt sienna cave walls. When Frisk bent to hand Vivaldi her Nice Cream, to their shock, Verdana broke away from them and skipped straight toward the guards.

"Heya! Aren't you guys hot?" Verdana said, giving Royal Guards 01 and 02 a friendly wave. The two guards matched in every respect but one: RG01 had longer, rabbitlike ears while RG02's ears resembled bat wings.

"Totally, kid!" replied RG01 on Verdana's left. "But our armor's, like, coated to deflect heat. So it's not so bad."

Smiling, Verdana gave his Nice Cream bar to RG01 and Vivaldi handed hers to RG02. "Here," the twins said. "Take this!"

RG02 made no sound but accepted the Nice Cream. "..."

"Like, thanks!" said RG01, his floppy ears perking up. He took RG02's bar and unwrapped it for him before handing it back to open his own. "Undyne, like, told us there was totally a human in the area. So, like, us Royal Guards are blocking off the elevators for now."

The twins stared at RG02 until he finally spoke. "...What?"

"Like, _no way_ you're getting by us," continued RG01, happily unwrapping his bar. "But, between you and me, I think you could go through that creepy lab over there."

"Um, thank you very much," Frisk said, chuckling nervously as they prodded their children's backs to steer them toward the lab, leaving the guards behind to slurp their Nice Cream. Of course, once they reached a safe distance, Frisk ruffled the twins' hair out of sheer pride for their generosity.

A large, white building, clearly marked "LAB", came into view with a blocky appearance that struck Frisk as a bit sterile, but far more welcoming than expected. At first glance, Alphys' lab in this world starkly contrasted with her counterpart's dark dungeon littered with blood, dust, and scrap metal that Sans had long ago deemed a 'shithole'. Frisk's nose remembered its coppery smell. To the family's gratitude, the moment the lab's front door slid open and they all walked onto the blue, tiled floor, the space inside was cool, comfortable, and well lit with soft, cheerful light. To their left, a gleaming escalator hummed as it descended from a second floor balcony. Ahead of them was the messiest desk known to man or monster and, next to it, a television—?

Frisk halted, seeing themselves and their children displayed on the television's enormous screen. When the twins tried waving their hands in front of it, the video feed captured their every movement like a mirror and magnified them, making Frisk feel like they were wiggling worms under a microscope. Had Alphys been watching them this whole time? But that was impossible. It was not like there were cameras everywhere...right?

Suddenly, Frisk remembered spying an object shining within a snowy bush once or twice during their journey, and even once behind a waterfall. Their mind had been too full of other concerns at the time, between juggling the twins' safety and the strangeness of this parallel universe, to check what the objects were.

Lenses. Camera lenses.

The human wanted to kick themselves. How could they have been so careless? What if this world's Alphys found out their children were hybrids? Then, it hit them. The twins had already changed forms multiple times. Frisk had _told_ them to transform! Of course Alphys knew! She _had_ to know!

Had they come this far for nothing?

Transfixed, Frisk walked up to the screen and touched it with shaking fingers, failing to notice the soft tug at their pants and the hushed voices of their children.

"Mommy?" said Verdana, leaning on Frisk's hip. "Please don't worry."

"We'll be okay," murmured Vivaldi. "We promise."

All of a sudden, a loud screech echoed in the hall like that of a strangled chicken. As the trio turned away from the video feed, a squat, yellow dinosaur waddled in their direction, her eyes and nose streaming with tears and snot, though she dabbed at the latter with a clump of pink tissues. She then blew into the tissues and sobbed.

"Are you," whispered Frisk, looking the monster up and down in amazement, "Dr. Alphys?"

Instead of answering, a flood of slurred words and weeping flowed out. "Uuuuuugh y-y-yes I am but you—your family's so—s-s-so beeeeeeautifuuuuuuul!"

Viv and Ver blinked. "Huh?"

"Bathroom!" Alphys cried, turning on her heel and bolting toward a door marked with a yellow dinosaur sign. She promptly disappeared behind the door and slammed it shut.

Needing a moment to register what had just happened, Frisk settled into Alphys' swivel chair in front of her wreck of a desk. Several opened, partially eaten noodle cups were stacked high between beaten-up figures of anime catgirls. Seemed this Alphys and theirs had that much in common.

"Whoa, Viv, check out this cube thing!" Verdana cried from some place above Frisk's head. Another escalator on the right of the bathroom rose to the second floor; with Verdana's speed, it was hard to tell if he had teleported or merely run upstairs.

Frisk sighed. This was why mothers never sat down.

"Don't touch Dr. Alphys' things! We're in someone else's house," they called, following their son up the escalator. A conveyor belt sped them to his side in seconds, just in time to watch him push a hidden button or lever in the large, soft cube. Fortunately, the only consequence of touching Alphys' cube was that it popped open into a very easy to draw bed.

Vivaldi was busy checking out Alphys' bookshelves. She opened a book labeled 'Human History' and flipped the comic book inside to a page with a hideous android in a sailor uniform, running with toast in its mouth. Vivaldi read aloud, "'Oh no! Mizuki's going to be late for school, uwaa uwaa!'"

That did not strike Frisk as accurate.

"What's this goo?" Verdana said, hopping off the bed and scrunching his nose at an odd machine with a metal tube that churned out a constant supply of pink, goopy stuff. The boy dropped onto the floor to check out the machine's base when, suddenly, a shadow fell across him.

"S'posed to be ice cream."

It was Sans.

"Aah!" Verdana spun backward and nearly knocked over the machine.

Frisk gaped. Vivaldi dropped the other 'History' book in her hands—this one about a space pirate idol group in frilly maid costumes—and cried, "You're here?!"

"Said I'd bump into ya. Beyond that, want an answer that makes sense," asked Sans, with a shrug, "or the real one?"

"Uh, the real one?" Verdana said, sticking his finger in the bubblegum pink goop and sneaking a taste. He recoiled. It was much too sweet, even for him.

"Been running reports," Sans said, scratching behind his back. "Came here to verify 'em."

Frisk hummed in thought, and a sweatdrop beaded on Sans' pate. The human understood that?

"O-o-okay," Alphys said, emerging from parts unknown and climbing her escalator to rejoin the group upstairs. Her face and lab coat's collar were damp as if she had just splashed her whole head with water. "I'm okay."

"Heya, Alph," said Sans, with a slight wave. "Whatcha got?"

"Well, to start with," Alphys said, surprisingly unsurprised to see Sans, but crossing to where the twins now bounced together on her opened bed, "may I borrow those hair clips?"

"Wish you could," Vivaldi muttered, flopping onto her bottom.

"They won't come off," Verdana said, sitting beside his sister. He shifted from human to skeleton and clawed at his barrette without success.

"And they shocked me badly when I tried removing them," Frisk said, running fretful fingers through their bangs.

"I've seen what they do, and I know where you got them," Alphys said, looking down at her feet, her voice raspy. "Please, let me try."

Curious, the twins scooted to the edge of the bed and held still. Alphys reached both her hands toward the barrettes and touched the crystal buttercups at the same time. The clips unfastened and popped right off. As soon as Alphys stepped back, clips in hand, Frisk looked the twins over. No marks of any kind, not on their skin or skulls.

"You p-probably already guessed what these do. They tap into the twins' magic and amplify it," said Alphys, holding out the clips to shine in the overhead light while avoiding Frisk's gaze. "But you should know how I—the other me—how I made them. The crystals act as soul containers, in this case, for both human _and_ monster souls. That's nearly impossible to do because most monster souls can't persist after death, but I must've found a way. All the souls had to be extracted and preserved—somehow," she said, glancing aside, her face burning with shame.

Frisk watched as Sans nodded along while Alphys explained what she could derive without a full analysis: the crystals' limitations in this reality, immense potential in their home world, and attunement with Alphys' soul, which told Frisk that Sans got the verification he was after.

"Each barrette conducts the souls' power and attaches it to a compatible being, meaning these can only attach to hybrids," Alphys continued, motioning toward the twins. Her voice wavered. "Most of this is conjecture, of course, but...I know something about souls. I'm sure the other me knows more. A lot more."

"It's okay, Alphys." Frisk stepped close and, offering her a gentle smile, reached over to pat her stooped shoulder. It was clear to Frisk that this Alphys was the polar opposite of theirs. "I'm not mad."

"Don't you get it? I didn't have souls just lying around. Plus, only your kids can wear these, and only _I_ can take them off. Ever." Darkness fell over Alphys' eyes. "You should be mad."

"Not to interrupt you from beating yourself up across dimensions," Sans said, rubbing his skull, "but we were kinda hoping you knew how to get them back home."

"Oh! Right!" Alphys snapped to attention as sweat slid down her neck. "Um, the tricky part is the twins needed their power augmented to even get here, but that same power is super hard to control, and—"

 _Boom._

"Did you—?" Frisk began, glancing up.

 _Boom._

Alphys cringed. "—hear something?"

 _BOOM._

"Yup," said Sans, his eyelids drooping. A bit of plaster fell from the ceiling and landed in his hood.

Vivaldi and Verdana bolted upright. Whatever made that loud noise was drilling down through the ceiling, coming closer by the second.

 _BOOM BOOM BOOM!_

"S-sorry," stammered Alphys, tapping her claws together. "I forgot to warn you about—"

The ceiling shattered as a metal block with a light panel for a face crashed through it and shot rebar dangerously close to Frisk as if aiming for them. The large block, apparently a robot, landed on Alphys' dusty work table and snapped it in half, which sent the chainsaw on top of it flying until it embedded in the nearest bookshelf. The robot hopped off the debris, extended a single wheel from its bottom, and then spun in place while sprouting a pair of arms, one of them clutching a microphone.

Alphys blushed. "Mettaton."


	9. Action!

Lights, cameras, and disco balls descended from the upper reaches of Dr. Alphys' smashed laboratory ceiling. Whirring and clicking sounded in its heights from unseen gears and pulleys while ripped wiring drooped down and sparked in despair. Mettaton clapped, meanwhile, as confetti danced from the darkness above and rained on Frisk and the twins. Bowing for his television audience, he said, "Welcome, beauties, to today's quiz show!"

"Uncle Mettaton's a _box?!_ " shrieked Verdana, trying to push Frisk's hand out of his way so he could see better.

Vivaldi pointed at Mettaton and cried, "Where'd all your arms go?!"

"Don't be rude!" Frisk scolded, though they braced themselves to shield the twins from any falling rebar. In the middle of the flashy decorations and broadcast equipment dropped a multicolored, blinking sign that read 'Game Show'.

Frisk had no idea what to do. It was too late for the twins to change to monster form now that cameras were rolling in their faces. The whole Underground might be watching!

Meanwhile, Sans had fallen asleep. Standing up.

"Well, well, well~!" cooed Mettaton, rolling past the flabbergasted Alphys. "Rumor has it that a human has arrived in the Underground, and here they are, but wait—there's more! A _trio_ of humans!" Mettaton swayed toward Frisk and the twins to extend a graceful hand in their direction. At once, the cables in the ceiling lowered a garish podium with large, rectangular buttons until it landed with a thud in front of Frisk. "I can already tell it's gonna be a great show. Everyone give a big hand for our three wonderful contestants!"

Hot spotlights shined on Frisk and the twins in an array of colors among the spinning disco balls, and boisterous music played alongside recorded applause.

"Never played before, lovelies? Let's do a warmup," Mettaton said, rolling dramatically to and fro to spite his robotic voice and block shape. He flipped the microphone in his hand and pointed it at his human contestants. "There's only one rule. Can anyone tell me what it is?"

"Um," said Vivaldi, who raised her hand like she was at school, "no cheating?"

"Cheating _would_ defeat the purpose of our show, but no, darling," said Mettaton, blowing the little girl a kiss.

"Oh, I know!" piped up Verdana, leaping toward the microphone. "Kick ass!"

" _Verdana!_ " cried Frisk, taking both their open hands with palms facing forward and swishing them back and forth in concert. ' _Behave!_ '

The boy had enough sense to blush. "But that's what Daddy says!"

Sans snored. Or was that a snort?

"We _do_ have a strict schedule to keep, so know that our game is simple~" said Mettaton, his display panel flashing yellow.

"Answer correctly..."

His panel blinked and flared red.

"OR YOU DIE."

Viv and Ver shrank behind Frisk as Alphys gulped. They had little doubt Mettaton could make good on his threat. Frisk, however, stood firm. They had not made it this far to quit. Not when they were almost home.

The game show began. Frisk somewhat recalled its questions, since life-or-death situations were powerful memory stimuli, and it helped that Frisk was not blind, numb in each limb due to overgrown flowers, or hobbling around with Sans as their giant crutch. The content was milder, too, like counting flies in a jar instead of bloodied fingernails.

Several turns in, however, the questions turned into trick questions. On the verge of getting zapped, Frisk spied Alphys curving her hands into letters. She was giving them answers!

Soon after, an insanely long word problem made the clock run down while Frisk and Alphys read it, but then, a wisp of blue punched the correct answer as the clock reached "1".

Frisk glanced sidelong at Sans. Was he really sleeping?

The game show continued.

"In the dating simulation, Mew Mew Kissy Cutie, what is Mew Mew's favorite—"

Flush with fangirl joy, Alphys squealed the answer. In detail. And then went on to explain how snail ice cream related to its powerful lesson on friendship.

Cover blown.

"Alphys, Alphys, Alphys. You aren't helping our contestant, are you? Ooooooh! You should have told me!" said Mettaton, bouncing on his wheel merrily. He wagged his finger and tsked. "I'll ask a question you'll be sure to know the answer to!" Spinning in place and turning toward Frisk, he cried, "Who is Dr. Alphys' crush?"

* Undyne  
* Asgore  
* The human  
* Don't know

Frisk dragged their fingertips toward the most obvious answer, feeling badly about it, but—

"UNDYNE!" the twins yelled, poking out their heads from behind Frisk's back and reaching toward the button.

Alphys crumpled into a scarlet, flaming ball of shame. "Aaaah…."

But in that instant, Frisk cringed and instead pressed the button for "Don't know".

"Moooooom!" Viv and Ver groaned.

"Correct," said Mettaton, patting the light panel on his chest.

The twins blinked. "Huh?!"

"Dr. Alphys has a crush on...the unknowable," Mettaton continued, giving Alphys an eyeless, metallic look of disdain. "You see, Alphys believes there is someone out there. Someone watching her. Someone she thinks is 'cute' and 'interesting'." The robot waved to empty air. "Hello, theoretical person. Dr. Alphys likes you. Too bad you're not real."

A derisive laughtrack sounded out of nowhere. Frisk looked around the destroyed ceiling but saw no speakers.

Sans kept snoring.

"H-hey, I've done research about this!" Alphys cried, sweating with embarrassment. She tugged at her collar and mumbled, "There are alternate universes out there! S-someday, maybe, I could meet them..."

" _We like you, Dr. Alphys!_ " the twins cheered, the flashing lights of the game show glinting on their pointy teeth. Smiling, Frisk nodded their agreement. Even after such a brief introduction, to them, Alphys was precious.

Alphys scratched her blushing cheek. "T-thanks."

"Well, well, well," Mettaton said, his electronic voice chiding them all. "With Dr. Alphys helping you, the show has no dramatic tension. But this was just the pilot episode! Next up, more drama! More romance! More bloodshed! Until next time, darlings~" he said, retracting his wheel, converting it into a rocket, and blasting out of sight.

Once all the cameras and other tech slipped out of view, silence fell except for the crackle of distant, sparking wires. A slip of paper fluttered from above toward Alphys, who flailed wildly and just managed to grab it. Then, the scientist groaned. It was an IOU from MTT.

"Now that everyone knows we're hiding humans," Sans said, deciding his nap was done, blinking his eye sockets open, and peering at Alphys, "got any idea how to send 'em home? 'Cause I got a theory. Our Underground's got a barrier, but they," he said, jerking his thumb in Frisk's direction, "already broke theirs. If their human's missing, so's ours."

"Oh no," Alphys said, clasping her face in both hands. "You don't mean—?"

Frisk sat on Alphys' bed once more between the twins, who flopped sideways onto their lap. In all Frisk's desperation, in all their eagerness to bring their children home, it had not occurred to them that they had replaced someone, a human like them who had fallen into this Underground.

The human of this world.

"What about us?" murmured Vivaldi, snuggling against her mother. This was too confusing for one day, let alone several. It was hard to keep up.

"You and Ver were born on the surface. You're special," Frisk said, stroking her hair. Then, realization dawned on Frisk, and they gasped. "That means the other me is—!"

"Yup," Sans said. A styrofoam cup of cooked, instant noodles appeared in his hands, fetched directly from Alphys' stash. "With the other me."

Alphys furrowed her eyebrows at Sans. "Why the other you?"

"That's his wife. Those are his kids. That's why they're skeletons," Sans said, producing a pair of plastic forks before handing the steaming cup to Frisk for the grateful, smiling twins. "Might wanna blow on it first."

"Can't believe you said that with a straight face," said Alphys, a fine blush spreading on her nose.

"I'm a chill skell. Other me? Not so chill right now," said Sans as he shrugged. A bag of popato chisps appeared in his hands next, and he pulled it open. "If anything, he's chomping at the bit hard enough to break his sharp teeth."

Frisk bit their lip, their red eyes brimming with worry as they gathered in the twins and held the noodle cup for them. They knew better than anyone what happened when their husband lost control.

"So we want to create conditions where our worlds can intersect again," Alphys said, guilt sagging her shoulders. Pulling the barrettes out of her lab coat pocket, she sighed. "Viv and Ver can try, but..."

"We don't even know what we did!" Verdana said. Woefully, he blew on the drooping noodles that Frisk offered.

"Wait!" Vivaldi shook her head, reached over, and took her brother's hand. "It's because we did this, right?"

With sudden understanding, they both closed their eyes and, before long, the light around them tinted red, blending into the stripes of their sweaters.

"We wanted to see the Underground," said Vivaldi.

Verdana mumbled, "We were bored, so..."

"...we wanted to go right away," Vivaldi finished, beginning to sniffle.

"You didn't mean to come here. Your magic was too big, remember?" Frisk said, softly. The twins nodded, but held their mother's legs tight. "Please don't blame yourselves." Then, Frisk smiled, realizing just how much Viv and Ver's unconscious intent to travel Underground resembled their very conception. They set down the Instant Noodles and rubbed the twins' trembling backs. "Can you think of Daddy?"

The twins nodded again. At the same moment, the barrettes flashed white in Alphys' hand, and she flinched. Perhaps their proximity to the twins activated them? But Alphys' thoughts were cut off when voices sounded from the crystals.

 _'They're contacting us—'_

 _'VIV! VER! SWEETHEART!'_

"Sans?" Frisk whispered. At the sound of their husband, their heart jumped and a pair of tears slipped down their cheeks. His voice. His name for them.

"Daddy!" shouted the twins, opening their eyes but keeping their hands firmly clasped.

Frisk cleared their throat and called out, "We're here! We're safe!"

 _'Heard that?! Now bring them home, you scaly piece of shit! NOW!'_

 _'Ugh, I already told you I can't. The twins did it, not me. Wait—my readings say I deactivated the crystals. How in the hell—?'_

"Of course _I_ deactivated them!" Alphys' grunted, her snout flaring with anger. "Now shut up so the twins can focus on teleporting!"

 _'They can't teleport across dimensions without the crystals attached, you fool! They're hybrids! Why do you think I augmented their magic in the first place? Their only magic source is their father!'_

"Heya, Sans here," said the squat skeleton from his spot beside Alphys' busted workbench, his eyes drawn closed while he gave the bloom of fragmented light in Alphys' hand a friendly wave. "Other-Sans, got a human with ya?"

 _'Sans?! What the f—'_

"Kids present, Other-Me," said Sans, his grin fixed. "Got a human?"

 _'...Yeah. A human kid named Frisk.'_

"Good," said Alphys, breathless. "Please keep them close, Sans. We're sending your family home."

 _'No, you're not, idiot. The Sans with you can't help because he isn't their father.'_

"But he helped us before when our magic went crazy," said Vivaldi. "Right, Ver?"

"Uh huh!" nodded Verdana, excited.

"My children do have a version of your magic," said Frisk, motioning to the Sans in front of them. "Please, try to help us."

"Can't promise nothing." Though groggy enough to fall back asleep, Sans stepped closer and joined his hands with the twins. "But here goes."

As soon as he did so, Frisk pressed their forehead to their children, who tuned out all the arguments surrounding them and focused solely on the father they loved.

A brilliant, scarlet light, bolstered by Sans' blue, shot from between the twins and swallowed the room. It grew and grew until everything else faded. The red light shifted to gold, and then gained dark outlines which sprang up into a wide room of columns and stained glass.

The judgement hall.


	10. Anomaly

Vivaldi and Verdana emerged with their mother and Sans in the middle of the judgement hall, sitting together on the cold, polished tiles. Thick columns supported the high ceiling and cut swaths of darkness across the vast room, sheltering them in their shade. Immediately, however, Sans vanished and reappeared beside Alphys. The reason was clear: an Alphys double her size loomed over her, but then backed off at Sans' approach. The twins felt Frisk's hands pull them closer.

Just then, directly opposite the twins appeared a giant skeleton who wore thick sneakers and a star necklace that dangled against his enormous red sweater, glinting like his razor sharp teeth. Curiously, a child with a purple striped shirt sat on his hulking shoulders and latched onto his neck.

"Daddy!"

The moment this Sans materialized, he teleported the short distance to his family's side as red tears streamed down his cheekbones. He dropped to his knees while the human child offered the twins a gentle smile and hopped off Sans' shoulders onto the golden floor, making room for Vivaldi and Verdana to scramble to their feet and fling themselves at their father. Sans threw his arms around them, caressed the twins' weeping faces, and then kissed his wife deeply, over and over, as if he had found a desert oasis.

In the shadow of a neighboring column, the giant Alphys scowled.

"Fantastic. Now we're all trapped in your world," grumbled Alphys, wearing a black and red striped sweater beneath her lab coat. This Alphys snorted at the affectionate display, adjusted the thick glasses on her crooked nose, and then glanced to her side, staring down her meddling other self with a sneer.

"Dunno, Other-Alph," said the Sans of this world, plucking a bit of plaster off his blue hood before lifting it to cover his skull. He shuffled closer to his Alphys, who was busy curling into her dirty lab coat in a flimsy attempt to disappear. "Seems this room's a nexus."

"'Seems' you pulled that idea out of your assbone," said the giant Alphys with a grunt, looking over this Sans' pink slippers with disdain. "Always a lazy oaf."

"Good thing for you, huh?" he replied, his eye sockets going black. The darkness of his hood made him look like death itself. Without diverting his gaze from the hostile dinosaur across from him, he said, "Hey, Other-Me. I see the human kid never leveled. How'd they do?"

"Better'n me. If not for them, I woulda dusted that bitch," said Sans, keeping his wife and children secure in his arms as he aimed a flaring red glare at the Alphys of his world. Holding them tighter, he added, "Thankfully, the kid reminded me of someone. Three someones."

Fidgeting by his side, the human child shivered despite the warmth of their purple sweater. "There's a barrier here, right? That means King Asgore wants my soul."

"Wish I could help ya, kid." With the thick, red cuff of his sweater, Sans dabbed at the beginnings of the little human's tears and ruffled their hair with his enormous, skeletal hand. "Thing about you? You're kind _and_ brave. You don't quit." Then, turning to gaze at his wife, he chuckled and said, "No matter what, you're too damn stubborn."

Frisk wiped their own, happy tears from their shining red eyes and nudged their husband playfully. Then, with a sweet smile, they nodded at their child self and said, "Stay determined, okay?"

"Yeah." The little human smiled back.

"Wait a minute!" growled the Alphys in black, stomping her foot with a ferocity that smacked the walls. Annoying as it was to be sucked out of her dimension, the way things now stood, those twins were well out of her reach forever. That was salt in her scales. "There is something here that belongs to me."

"You are not getting back those crystals!" cried Alphys, standing up as straight as possible though the other Alphys still dwarfed her. She clenched her jaw. "How many innocent humans and monsters died to make these?"

" _Innocent?_ What the hell do you know about that?" said Alphys, crossing her arms over her striped shirt and chortling. She arched her eyebrow. "Look at you acting so high and mighty. I know how our mind works." Smirking, she stepped closer to the demure, shivering Alphys and locked eyes with her. "Know what I think?" she said, dropping her voice low. "You dirtied your claws just enough to understand how I formed these crystals but lacked the guts to do it yourself. You are wasted potential."

Suddenly, her nostrils flaring, the giant Alphys gave her right arm a shake, unlocking an attached gun that she then aimed at her shorter self's chest. "You won't waste my invention."

In a flash, she found herself sandwiched between both versions of Sans and surrounded by a slew of bones and blasters, blue and red, aimed at every point of her weathered body.

Vivaldi and Verdana teleported to shield Alphys— _their_ Alphys. They breathed heavily; that had taken all their effort to accomplish with their own power. "Stop!"

Both Sanses halted, their dual array of bones frozen in place.

Both Frisks gasped, the older swallowing hard and turning pale.

"Get away from her!" said Alphys, holding the crystal barrettes close to her chest and wrapping her lab coat around her small, shivering frame. "She—she wants to—!"

"We know," Verdana said, looking over his shoulder at his Alphys. Whether that Alphys trembled from the threat of instant decimation or from the twins' close proximity was anyone's guess.

"But please don't fight," said Vivaldi, her arms spread protectively alongside her brother.

"We just—"

"—want to go home."

Silence hung in the air. Once more, the twins joined hands. Weak magic or not, they were determined.

"Think _really_ hard before you answer, Other-Alph. I've got all the _time_ in the world. Because here?" said Sans, his left eye glowing blue in the darkness under his hood. "You're the anomaly."

"If you think I'm gonna cover your ass on his turf, or let you _ever_ touch my kids," Sans said, looming beside her with his eyes blazing red, "you're _dead_ wrong."

Alphys rolled her eyes, squeezed her feet onto a single floor tile between the skeletons, and shifted uncomfortably. "Fine. If the Frisk and Sans from my reality hold the barrettes and the twins at the same time, it should prevent the crystals from reattaching but increase the twins' magical potential enough to bring us home. Satisfied?"

Under his blue hoodie, Sans yawned. "Yup."

Across from him, Sans' gold tooth sparkled. "Works for me."

"Thank you, Dr. Alphys," said Verdana and Vivaldi, stepping back, bowing, and giving her their pair of pointy-toothed grins before dashing across the room to their mother. Only after they reached the pillar where both Frisks waited did Sans' red bones dissipate.

Sans' blue magic stayed on guard between the Alphyses, and the small skeleton did not hesitate—despite being half her size—to stare down the foreign Alphys for as long as necessary.

Reaching the younger Frisk, the twins filled them in on the adventures that they and their mother had experienced in the child's place. With their heads huddled together, the kids looked like triplets. At that, Sans admitted to his wife that the queen's cover story for their museum disappearance was that the twins had peed themselves and needed to change clothes. After that, the child Frisk had posed as Viv or Ver several times with mixed results.

Meanwhile, the twins told little Frisk that, despite the need to avoid a certain talking flower or the boxy Mettaton, they should go hang out with a cool monster kid, their super cool Uncle Papyrus, and their Aunt Undyne in Waterfall. They pointed out a gold save star in the far corner of the judgement hall that only the three children could see and mentioned that, if Frisk was hungry, there should be plenty of Cinnamon Bunnies in the neighboring storage box.

Upon hearing this, the adult Frisk smiled. Crouching to meet their younger self, they handed them Toriel's cell phone and said, "Here. You'll need it."

"What is _that?!_ " cried both versions of Alphys. As the larger Alphys was guarded by the smaller Sans, only the smaller Alphys crossed the hall and grabbed Frisk's brick of a cell phone in shock. "This doesn't even have Undernet access!" She beamed at the child Frisk and assured them, "I'll upgrade it in a jiffy."

The other Alphys snorted, but knew enough to keep her mouth shut.

"We ready?" Sans asked his twins, giving his smaller self across the hall a knowing look. Neither Sans was about to take any chances.

"Uh huh," said Verdana. Giving Vivaldi a boost, he then, with his mother's help, climbed onto Sans' broad shoulders. Both twins grasped their father's neck and finally felt safe.

"Wish I could just leave your slimy ass here," the giant Sans then barked as he crossed the room and grabbed the Alphys who caused this mess by her thick wrist, "but the other me needs a good week and a half to sleep off your bullshit."

"Yup," replied the Sans in blue, yawning again. He was too wiped out to bother telling himself to watch his language around the kiddos.

Once the travelers had formed a circle, Vivaldi snuggled against her father's skull and asked, "What if Ver and I can't do it?"

"You will, sweetpea," he answered, as Frisk reached up to touch her small hand. "We both gotcha."

"Sorry for the trouble," Frisk then said, turning toward this world's much kinder Alphys to accept the barrettes.

"Just glad I could help," the dinosaur said, smiling broadly. Her eyes sparkling, she continued, "Oh, hey! In your world, is there a dating sim called—"

"Uh, Alph?" said the Sans by her side, opening one eye. "They gotta go."

"Hmph. Bet you drool over those sugary, magical girls and their so-called power of friendship," said Alphys, wincing at her Sans' viselike grip on her wrist.

Securing the twins on his shoulders, Sans looked down at his smaller version. "Hang in there, pal."

"Yep." Still smiling, Sans drifted into a light snooze.

Then, as Vivaldi and Verdana held their father tightly, Frisk waved goodbye to the small, hopeful human. Knowing the child's burdens and the rough journey still ahead, Frisk's soul ached for them. But then, they thanked whatever had formed this world that the flower curse was not a part of it. No child should ever endure that.

Giggling, the young Frisk smiled and waved back.

Not wishing to risk the twins reattaching to the crystals, Sans and Frisk grasped the hair clips while the four of them embraced. With their arms wound around each other, his monster soul, their human soul, and the hybrid souls of the twins shone brightly. Together, they all thought of one place.

Home.

* * *

Frisk, Sans, and Alphys watched as their strange friends vanished, leaving them alone in the golden hall.

"W-well, that was certainly something. Guess there _are_ alternate universes out there!" Alphys said. Then, she squirmed and scratched the back of her neck. "Not like we can tell anybody."

Nodding in a daze, Frisk surveyed the stained glass windows. The emblem they displayed, a winged angel floating above three mountains, looked familiar, but this was way too much for one day. The child's head was full.

"Welp, I'm going to Grillby's," said Sans, grinning. A fraction of normalcy was better than nothing. He glanced sidelong at both of his companions and held out his bony hands to them. "Howzabout it? I know a shortcut."

* * *

Days later, Vivaldi and Verdana oohed and ahhed together, marveling at the Museum of Monster History's restored throne room with its pair of massive, carved seats. Though this room felt imposing from its sheer size, cheerful light streamed in and played atop scores of buttercups in a sprawling, but delicate flower bed. Toriel plunked the twins onto Asgore's lap while he told them stories about the first royal proclamations given in this room so many years ago.

Nearby, Sans tugged Frisk's hand to lace his fingers through theirs.

Alphys' plan to put the twins in her control had backfired spectacularly. With her violent experimentation exposed, the scientist was going nowhere near the twins or anyone else from now on. Undyne had to suffer penalties, too, including a lengthy suspension; though she had been clueless about the barrettes' power, she was still responsible for the security breach. Frisk had begged for more leniency toward Undyne, but accepted that Asgore, Toriel, and Sans refused to take any more chances.

Holding Sans' hand tightly, Frisk let their fears melt away. It was still hard to believe that an alternate Underground existed, an Underground that, although dangerous, was filled with friends and free of poisoned flowers. Thanks to the warmth and mercy of the monsters they had met on their way, their twins now rested safely and happily on their grandfather's knee.

Frisk smiled, knowing hopeful memories would remain with Verdana and Vivaldi. And that was a treasure far greater than any crystal.


End file.
